Milady Maker—A peek into the sinister underbelly of NFT art

How a creator’s dark past greased the success of their project.

Trigger Warning: This article contains references to Nazi symbolism, eating disorders, and hate crimes.

In August 2021, a collection of 10,000 anime-inspired non-fungible tokens (NFTs) called “Mlady Maker” hit the market. The project was the brainchild of the crypto-based business Remilia Collective. When the project began, these NFTs looked just like any other typical algorithm-generated collection (like Cryptopunks or Bored Apes).

Months later, this collection became embroiled in controversy after controversy. The situation got so bad that in May 2022, the floor prices of Milady NFTs fell to 0.26 ETH ($472.50 as of June 2, 2022) from an all-time high of $6,000. Here is an overview of all the events that led to the downfall of this collection and its creator.

Alleged use of Nazi motifs

Just a month after the initial release of Milady Maker, a spin-off compilation called “Milady, That BITCH” was dropped. This collection received public attention, but not for the right reasons. People began to notice that some NFTs featured characters with the word “Treblinka” on their shirts. For those unfamiliar with this word, it is the name of a Nazi concentration camp from World War II. Remilia Collective apologized for their error, claiming that the words on the characters’ shirts were randomly generated.

While this could be considered an innocent mistake in isolation, people began to point to another Nazi-esque motif used in this collection. In October 2021, the creator of Milady NFTs, Charlotte Fang, released an essay explaining what made certain Miladys more valuable than others. The essay shows that the grades of Milady NFTs go from “SS”, “S”, “A”, “B”, “C” to “Normal”, with “Normal” being the lowest rank. The use of “SS” as the highest rank was criticized because of the association of these initials with the Nazi parliamentary organization, the Schutzstaffel. Fang, denied any Nazi implication in the ranking system and claimed it was borrowed from Japanese video games and card games.

Remilia Collective’s dark past

Not only in the Milady NFT collections, the Nazi motifs can also be observed in the previous activity of the Remilia Collective. If you’re active on Twitter, you’ll see threads upon threads discussing the alleged problematic history of the Remilia Collective. Twitter user @planet_neft wrote a detailed thread that talks about how the collective was previously involved in convincing young girls to self-harm under the guise of the neo-Nazi pro-anorexia group Kaliacc. It is short for Kali Yuga Accelerationism. The Yuga cycle, which is a cyclical age in Hindu cosmology, has been referred to by many right-wing white supremacist groups, and the Kali Yuga is the period when the world will be destroyed and recreated.

Run by a group of people who go by the names “Sunny” and “Miya”, Kaliacc’s Discord servers will have strict guidelines where only those with a BMI under 19 will be allowed to join. In these groups, young girls were brainwashed into scratching the leader’s name on their bodies. These girls will be encouraged to post pictures of self-harm on Instagram with the hashtag #kaliacc.

In addition to this, the alias Miya in particular has been responsible for creating a lot of hateful content. Their website, detailed that to save a nation, you must “kill all the Jews”. In another entry, Miya uses the n-word for black people and compares them to gorillas, saying they shouldn’t have been given the right to vote. Remila Collective’s website still links back to these themes and the two main characters behind Kaliacc. Also, there have been several screenshots circulates which shows Remilia Collective’s Twitter handle directly referencing Miya.

Charlotte Fang’s admission of guilt

On May 21, Fang became admitted that they used the alias Miya, claiming that in real life they wouldn’t even hurt a fly. They further stated that Milady Maker would be transitioning from management to @YOJIMBO_KING and @Milady_Sonoro. Fang never apologized for the hurtful things they said as Miya, but rather apologized for trying to hide the past.

Before Fang became aware of being Miya, they defended Miya as a piece of internet art that spreads problematic content in the name of critical satire. “Much of the content it produced was problematic. But who cares? It’s an artist’s duty to explore and critique the contemporary, even in all its ugliness, and if they decide that critique is best produced in a process of performative embodiment, then so be it so be it,” they said, explaining their attitude to Miya.

Some have compared Captures the behavior of a psychopath. Others are simply disappointed that an NFT collection they liked had such dark origins. “The early rumors and rumors I just dismissed as such. im f**king gutted & confused” Twitter user @gucciprayers tweetedwith many others saying they felt the same way.

But where does this leave Milady Maker? Well, at the time of this writing, the project’s minimum price is 0.41 ETH, and has fallen by 70% in the last 14 days. Moreover, other projects that the Remilia collective was involved in have also distanced themselves from the controversies. Fang, who was one of the key organizers of the Spice DAO (which bought director Alejandro Jodorowsky’s Dune art book) has now resigned from his position at the DAO. Whether any of these projects will be able to recover from being involved with such a controversial figure remains to be seen. Besides Miladys, some question other biggest NFT projects, including Bored Apes Yacht Club, screaming racist ideology and alt-right iconography. So far, it seems people are still mad at Fang, and rightfully so.

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Top image courtesy of OpenSea